It’s 1:55 p.m. Bags lean against chairs while notebooks and papers are scattered over desktops. The click-clack of fingers tapping away on keyboards never stops. A quick click of the mouse on the printer icon sends a document to a printer at the Luther Bonney computer lab. But this year there is a change in printing, a four-cent change.
The USM community now pays to print from computer labs across campus. Students can log into computers using their name and Social Security Number or PIN number. When they want to print, they click on the print icon. A dialog box appears on the screen. It shows the number of pages to print, the cost of the printing, and the remaining balance on the account.
“Printing had more than doubled but the enrollment of students stayed the same,” said Carol Sobczak, microcomputer operations manager, software services. “The tech fee wasn’t covering all the costs, [so] rather than raising the technology fee, the change only affects the users who print.”
Yet it is a change for the community that once had a free printing service on campus.
Last school year Melissa White, a sophomore and an industrial Technology major, didn’t have a printer; this year she’s getting one.
“As little as it [the fee] is, it does add up.”
In the past the cost of paper and toner exceeded the technology fee, but the fee is designed to eliminate excessive printing and create accountability, Sobczak said.
“People printed entire Web sites. Now people are learning about taking notes from a Web site or utilizing print preview.”
“I thought our tech fee paid for our printing,” said Josh Holt junior psychology major.
Holt plans to pass in work by using digital drop box on the blackboard program. Blackboard usage and electronic reserve users have increased, while others opt to just not use the computer lab for their printing needs.
“I’m forced to get the Internet at home because of the amount of stuff I have to print,” said Jessica Schwartz senior biology major. “I pay enough for school. I understand being charged for printing 30 pages, but they offered a service and now it’s not there.”
Software services did notice glitches with the first weeks of printing, but they are closer to a solution. They view each problem as an opportunity to learn.
“If there are jams, the printer will recover. The machine restarts the print job again,” Sobczak said. “The lab staff can also release a print job.”
It is too soon to determine if printing has decreased although there is a change in printing behaviors.
“The Glickman Library has had more cancelled printing jobs in the last few weeks,” said David Eldridge, software support specialist of software services.
The community questions whether it really needs to print something, he said.
“A certain amount of education is happening,” Sobczak said. “If people need help all they have to do is ask.”